Salvation Army Matches Homeless, Jobs

January 12, 1989|By SALLY DENEEN, Staff Writer

The word is spreading.

A major topic rippling through the conversations of Palm Beach County transients nowadays is a new Salvation Army project that tries to teach wandering homeless men to settle down and work a steady job, said Major Charles Smith, of the Salvation Army in West Palm Beach.

``Word is passing that one of the `in` things is to get on the program,`` Smith said.

The reason: Homeless men are guaranteed a place to sleep for three weeks as long as they work those three weeks at a guaranteed job at Labor World in West Palm Beach.

They earn $4 to $7.50 an hour at Labor World -- somewhat higher than typical, minimum-wage-paying day labor, Smith said.

They sleep at the Salvation Army homeless shelter without the need of lining up at 5 p.m. each day to get a bed under the normal first-come, first-served policy.

As tempting as it might sound, it is hard for some homeless men to follow these two basic points, intended to lead them to more-settled lives.

``It`s sort of an inbred type of thing where the people have itchy feet,`` Smith said. ``We call it, at the Salvation Army,wanderlust.``

Some 109 men have tried the program since it started in mid-November, he said.

Only 30 finished at least one complete week of work, Smith said. Most worked a couple of days. The result is a failure rate of about 73 percent during the initial months of the program.

That isn`t bad, though, Smith said. The men likely would have stayed at the Salvation Army shelter anyway.

The program merely prods the men to try to become a little more permanent in their thinking, and provides in-depth counseling to help with their problems, Smith said.

Labor World branch manager Dave Mytnik said he likes the arrangement with Salvation Army. He sees no drawbacks, he said.

``It`s been a good way to recruit fairly talented people who maybe, at the time, were down on their luck,`` Mytnik said.

He said he has hired one person full-time. Workers are above-average compared to typical Labor World recruits, Mytnik said.

One homeless man, working as a carpenter, saved up money to buy a car after two weeks. Sometimes, two or three men will pool their money to rent a low- cost hotel room.

Mytnik said it is possible that Labor World agencies nationwide will copy the program. They could strike up arrangements with nearby homeless agencies, he said.

The Salvation Army nationally is moving away from warehousing homeless persons and toward trying to help solve their problems, Smith indicated.

Long ago, the shelter was just a place to stay short-term until a new home could be found. Today, Smith said, few can find homes with the high cost of housing.

``Now, even after they leave us, they have no place to go,`` he said.

``Most people can find a job, but a place to stay is a much more complicated matter,`` Smith said. ``There is very little low-income housing.``

For now, about 10 men at a time are on the pilot Salvation Army program. Smith`s goal has been 20. He hopes to reach it. ``We see the numbers increasing this year,`` he said.